VIDEO GAMES!!!!

(before that)

VIOLENT MOVIES & TV!!!

(before that)

BOOKS!!!

You know what the truth is? The world is SAFER now than it's ever been in generations. By any reasonable measure/time window, the rates of violent crime, murder, genocide are HISTORICALLY low even globally. I believe that the fear-mongering (even present in this thread) and media culture we live in alter our *perception* of our own safety. There aren't more children abducted than before, we just know all their names and feel somehow personally connected to their stories now. What has CLEARLY grown is outrage. And to borrow a phrase (link below for people who actually read/care about this stuff) "Percieved Risk = Risk (actual) + Outrage".

There's a reason we don't let kids bring guns to school -- it's because parents of kids that got accidentally (not columbine style) shot demanded those rules. The zero tolerance rules, like ANY rule, seem insane at the margins -- clearly this example is one (if it's a real example -- if the kid was only punished for lying, then it's just a convenient fiction).

So go ahead and blame all things "new" and that you don't value (and are therefore outraged that other people do). But the truth is all that newness also brought you remarkably low crime rates, even though populations have grown by multiples in your own lifetimes.

Pinker on this (From the Wall Street Journal, no less):
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904106704576583203589408180.html

Freakanomics on Risk:
http://www.freakonomics.com/2011/11/29/r...-peter-sandman/